Hybrid networked business solutions can allow an organization that purchases business software for use by employees, members, etc. of the organization (generally referred to herein as a business software customer) to access business applications offered via a software-as-a-service (e.g. cloud-based) approach as well as business applications supported by on-premises investments in business software systems by the business software customer. As used herein, the term “on-premises” refers to software installed and run on computers on the premises (e.g. at a facility owned or controlled by the business software customer) while the term “cloud-based” refers to software running on remote server computers, such as for example at a server facility or via one or more distributed computing facilities accessed over a wide area network such as the Internet. In general, a hybrid networked business solution approach includes integrating and combining business applications deployed on on-premises computing hardware with business applications offered as cloud-based products. Such an approach generally makes use of a hybrid deployment model, in which different business applications or components integrated into the hybrid networked business solution offering provided to users of the business software customer may be upgraded, updated, altered, etc. on differing timetables that are often not wholly under the control of the business software customer. In typical situations in which a business software customer offers a hybrid networked business solution in which an on-premises business application is integrated with one or more cloud-based BAs or vice versa, the complexity and efforts needed to operate and run such networked solutions can be significant and substantial.
For example, a business software customer can increasingly face challenges in managing its customer-specific system landscape that includes a complex set of interdependent business applications, particularly if the interdependent business applications include both on-premises solutions (typically under the control of the business software customer) and cloud-based solutions (typically not under the control of the business software customer). Such challenges can arise due to leveraging loosely coupled software products having different versions, different lifecycles, and different update and upgrade schedules. Knowing the impact or knowing the preparations needed for an upcoming product update can be quite difficult for the business software customer, especially when the customer can not influence the upgrade date decided by the software vendor (as may be the case for many cloud-based software products, for example).